shazza69

Have now booked our trip for activating our visas from gatwick to vancouver in october for 2 weeks then coming back to england to plan our next step. I am petrifiyed at the immigration process when i arrive in vancouver as i havnt a clue where to go what to do etc so if anyone has landed in vancouver any tips would be sooo helpful.

Also is halloween the same in canada, will i be getting trick or treaters knocking on my door etc. Just wondering weather to pack a dress up outfit for my son to take with us. I love halloween in england are canadians as big on it.

jericho

Halloween is practically a 2 week event in Canada- decorations etc go up way before October 31st. Trick or treating is a much bigger deal than in the UK.

Howefamily

Halloween is GREAT here, enjoy!!!

Former Lancastrian

You will get off the plane in Vancouver and make your way down into the Customs arrival hall along with hundreds of others from all over the world but dont be surprised to see lots of Asian nationals i.e. Korea, Japan, Phillipines etc etc.
You will try to figure out which line is moving the fastest to get to see a CBSA officer (Customs/Immigration). The happy smiling man/lady will politely ask you to step forward and say Hello/Bonjour. You will hand them your passport and declarartion card (fully completed with the instruction panel torn off and hopefully has not been placed in your mouth before handing it over). You will tell the person when asked that you are arriving to become a PR. They will then stamp your form and tell you to go to the Immigration office. There you may wait from 5 minutes to 3 hours to be processed (landed) and you will have your COPR form signed and dated.
You will supply Customs with a list of goods that you have with you and a list of goods to follow.
Read this link re your goods
http://www.cbsa.gc.ca/publications/d...d2-2-1-eng.pdf
Chances are they wont be handing out little flags or balloons welcoming you to Canada as we are in a bit of recession mode and the Federal Government has instructed CBSA to save money.
You will then leave the airport as a Permanent Resident of Canada.
Of course things might not go the way as I have described them due to whatever but thats the gist of it.

JonboyE

Trick or treating only happens on October 31st though, as said above, many people put decorations up a while before then. As a general rule the more your neighbors decorate their houses the more trick or treaters you will get. Stock up on lots of treats beforehand. It is a big event. The usual etiquette is that you leave your outside lights on when you want to receive the trick or treaters. When your treats have run out/you want to go to bed you turn off the outside lights.

In Vancouver Customs do not always ask for a goods to follow list if you are on a flying visit just to activate your visa. However, I would prepare and take one just in case. The landing process is very straightforward and is nothing to be concerned about. Relax.

Former Lancastrian

Halloween falls on a Wednesday night this year so if not into it you can always find one of the local watering holes that offer cheap wing night Wednesdays and go seek one out after work. Stay and watch a iced hockey game that will be on one of the multitude of TVs and then about 10 pm go home and Halloween will be over.

Oink

Very good suggestion. Its doesn't get much better than that here.

JGK

Yes Halloween is big, but there is also an etiquette if you don't want to participate.

Trick or Treaters don't generally knock on your door if you have the outside light at your front door switched off.

rivingtonpike

If you're only here for 2 weeks, will you have a front door for Halloweeners to knock on? If you have, the kids will love it. You can buy a cheap outfit for your son at Walmart; be a "cool" thing for him to take back to the UK.

MillieF

I was lucky enough to be 'landing' at Haloween last year with my eleven year old. As an adult it might have left me cold, but he thought it was magical, we went to a 'haunted house', were given sweets all over the place and it was just a nice atmosphere. As we didn't have a door, on 31st we went to the pictures, which was great because it wasn't overcrowded. This Haloween we will have our own front door and are going to 'do' Haloween properly - it's a happy thing we can talk about and plan for that gets us over the subject of starting a new school where you don't know anybody!

'Landing' was all a bit of an anti-climax, I sort of thought bells and whistles might sound, but the immigration bods just did their bits and off we went - you will be fine!

caleo

We landed last October as well, and our children absolutely loved Halloween, which we were invited to share with Voyager970 from BE.They had soooo many goodies after half an hour and the houses all looked so well decorated. It was a fantastic night for the children and the adults.

We landed in Toronto, but you will be guided through the process at the airport - it was fairly straightforward.